Good Luck, Yukikaze

by Chohei Kambayashi

  Engage, Yukikaze flashed on the screen, declaring her intention to attack. She now recognized tactical reconnaissance pod 32157 as an enemy and was suggesting that they destroy it. Rei authorized the action and sent the Rafe to do the deed.

  The Rafe followed Rei’s orders from Yukikaze. Readying itself for battle, it designated the recon pod as its target. Diving swiftly down, it strafed the pod with its gun. One shot, and the target exploded.

  Just as Rei was banking to confirm its destruction with his own eyes, he heard Captain Foss’s tense voice in the back. Yukikaze sounded a warning as she spoke.

  “Below, right, to our rear! Two JAM fighters, closing!”

  Yukikaze did a barrel roll. Rei confirmed for himself, then sent them into a sudden Immelmann turn. Yukikaze initiated an auto-attack, locking onto the targets and immediately releasing her short-range missiles. The lock wasn’t steady and the shots missed.

  Yukikaze quickly pulled her nose up as she turned to pursue the JAM, suddenly spinning her fuselage. The maneuver was beyond her design limitations. Without Rei doing any of the work, Yukikaze operated her control surfaces at maximum efficiency and quickly recovered, but Rei sensed that she was about to accelerate and killed the auto-maneuver switch. He pulled the throttle back to IDLE. The exhaust temperature was already fairly high, and if he didn’t pull back, the engines could superheat and destroy themselves. Rei set the dogfight switch to ON, telling Yukikaze that he would handle this threat.

  Yukikaze. This plane isn’t a Super Sylph. It’s a Maeve. The data on your old airframe doesn’t apply here. Leave this to me.

  Yukikaze didn’t object.

  They had altitude to spare. Pushing the throttle as high as he dared, Rei took them into a nearly vertical dive. Confirming that the engines had cooled down, he cautiously increased their output. It was just like swimming. If you rushed and messed up the timing of your breathing, you’d drown.

  Rei’s eyes found the enemy fighters. Having for a moment evaded Yukikaze’s attack, the JAM banked steeply and turned toward Yukikaze. They’d predicted the optimum attack course to take. Rei heard the warning buzzer sound as Yukikaze picked up their weapons lock. Rei instantly selected gun mode. Taking Yukikaze into a loose climbing turn, he waited till it felt right, then recklessly snapped over into a sharp bank. The high-G forces caused him to black out for a few moments. When his vision cleared, just as he’d figured, the JAM fighters were crossing right in front of him. His intuition was as sharp as ever. The enemy fighters were still turning.

  Cross attack. Firing time: 0.5 seconds. An instant later, the targets were behind him. Rei craned his neck around to confirm his hit.

  The Rafe flew through the smoke of their explosions and rejoined Yukikaze as the fragments of the two JAM planes fell to the ground. The Rafe had shot one of them down, apparently having imitated Yukikaze’s tactics.

  Rei confirmed their fuel stores. They could stay here a while longer. There were probably more JAM buried under the desert sands, searching for the SAF. Perhaps they were testing out using the recon pod to talk to us and only attacked when we rejected their overture, he thought. Suddenly, Rei was roused from this fantasy.

  In all the commotion moments before, he’d completely forgotten about Captain Foss. Noticing that her breathing sounded far weaker than it should have, Rei looked back and saw that she’d taken her mask off. She’d vomited inside of it. He quickly brought Yukikaze down to a lower altitude and told Foss how to clean out the blockage and reset the mask.

  He wondered what she had made of the battle just now. Despite having seen them, maybe she still thought the JAM were imaginary. Still, whatever she thought, what she now felt in her body was real. There was no way she could deny that. That goes for me as well, Rei thought.

  For now, this was good enough. A lot of information had been gathered for analysis, for both the SAF and Captain Foss.

  “Mission complete,” Rei said to her. “Returning to base.”

  IV

  COMBAT AWARENESS

  YUKIKAZE’S CENTRAL COMPUTER never slept, even when she was resting her wings in the hangar bay. Cables running from the floor provided her with electrical power as she waited on standby. The cables attached to her underside also contained circuits that linked Yukikaze to the SAF’s tactical computer, allowing her to read all of the data available to it.

  She could even access the missions and operational actions of SAF fighters currently in flight, although she couldn’t receive the intelligence they were gathering in real time. Fighters on sortie generally wouldn’t access headquarters except in cases of emergency. The information they gathered would be downloaded to the tactical computer in headquarters once they’d returned to base and been linked up to the cables in the hangar.

  The data would then be analyzed by the SAF in order to develop new strategies, and the raw, unfiltered data would be stored as well, accessible at any time. Flight crews back from their missions would use it to write up their sortie reports. They’d check it over, both to see if there were differences between their own memories and the data their planes had recorded, as well as to check if the decisions they’d made in flight were the right ones. This was done especially in cases where the JAM had attacked them unexpectedly, so as to determine from where the JAM had appeared and if it would have been possible to detect them sooner. It was useful after missions for the pilots to replay the past mission via onboard simulation in order to create more efficient hazard avoidance maneuvers. Since every sortie was a matter of life and death, pilots needed to draw on the knowledge gained from past experiences to help them survive. Many flight crews could be found in planes’ cockpits even when they weren’t writing their sortie reports.

  Rei, naturally, was no exception. He’d always spent more time in his cockpit than the other pilots, but lately he could be found in Yukikaze’s cockpit more frequently than ever. Since she’d shed her old body in favor of this new one, he’d grown eager to learn more about her. He sensed that the changes in her went beyond surface appearance. Wanting to know exactly what these changes were, he used any free time he could find during his rehabilitation to see Yukikaze directly.

  What does she think about when she is on standby? he wondered. What kind of conversations did she have with the tactical computer in HQ? He’d always wondered about that, and he’d spent a lot of time on board Yukikaze in the hangar trying to work that out.

  That was when Rei had a thought.

  Just how exactly did Yukikaze, the SAF’s computers, and the combat intelligence they contained feel about the JAM?

  To him, in the old days, Yukikaze was simply the plane he flew, but now he didn’t feel that way. Her central computer was now a discrete combat consciousness independent of him. It might not have been a consciousness identical to that of a human, but Yukikaze must have had some cognizance of the world she occupied. He wanted to know what that was. It was possible that the JAM understood Yukikaze and Earth’s machine intelligences better than he did. He knew for certain that the JAM considered machine intelligence to be real, while the state of humans was more ambiguous. If he could understand how Yukikaze and the computers she was connected to saw the JAM, then maybe he could get a clue as to exactly what this enemy humans called the JAM really were. This sort of work was better done on standby than while on a sortie. This was another battlefield, one where Yukikaze’s central computer could talk to the SAF combat intelligences. Rei felt ready to get back in the fight. There was no need for any more rehabilitation.

  Rei hadn’t been told by Major Booker that he was cleared for combat after his mission. He’d simply said that the merit of his sortie would be evaluated, and Booker ordered Rei to remain on standby until the evaluation was complete. Essentially, the major had told him to take it easy. The evaluation would take two days at most. Of course, he needed to file a sortie report as well, so he couldn’t just spend those two days sleeping.

  What the hell could they be taking two days to figure out? Rei as
ked himself. His physical strength wasn’t in question now. Even if he didn’t stick with the rehab schedule they’d set up for him, he’d be fine training on his own. He’d flown a combat sortie for the first time in a while and had passed with flying colors. The fact that Rei had returned to base still in one piece was proof of that. Or had he done something wrong? Was Major Booker telling him that he should take some time and take a hard look at the actions he’d taken in his first combat flight in a long time? That had to be it. Otherwise, “Remain on standby” was just his way of saying, “I’m giving you two days off.”

  And so Rei passed the days in Yukikaze’s cockpit. After looking back over his actions on his mission with Yukikaze’s central computer, with it agreeing that he’d done nothing wrong, he now turned to monitoring the link between Yukikaze and the SAF’s computers. He took his time doing so.

  By switching on the main display in her cockpit and watching the feed, he could see each occasion when Yukikaze would access the SAF’s tactical computer. Code numbers would suddenly scroll across the screen. He couldn’t tell the exact specifics of the data, but his eyes could follow and grasp the general type of data she was requesting and the arrangement of the data sent in reply.

  Yukikaze was gathering past data from the other planes through the data link circuit. That much he knew, but what was Yukikaze thinking and what was she discussing with the tactical computer? That, he could only imagine. The display didn’t show the data exchange at that level, since Yukikaze wasn’t equipped with that sort of interface. Of course, if he used a tactical computer terminal in headquarters, it would have been able to display the exchange in a human-readable form.

  Rei had already gone there to check it out.

  The tactical computer in SAF HQ told him by voice that Yukikaze was requesting records of the actions and gathered information of Unit 13, the Rafe. But in answer to why she was requesting the data, the computer could only guess that she was possibly running a combat simulation on her own.

  As far as what Yukikaze’s central computer was thinking and what judgments it was making, the tactical computer in the SAF headquarters was as much in the dark as he.

  Normally, this wouldn’t be a problem at all. The instinct to defeat the JAM was built in at the time of Yukikaze’s manufacture. The existence of that impulse meant that there was nothing at all strange about her researching tactics and strategies to use against the JAM while she was on standby. If one wanted to know what she’d learned, all they’d have to do is see how she reacted the next time she was in battle. Words weren’t necessary. Not in combat. There was no time then to ask what she was up to and then wait for an answer. That was the reason she wasn’t equipped with a system through which to communicate verbally with humans, and Rei hadn’t felt the need for one. At any rate, getting back to base in one piece was the important point. An analysis of what exactly the JAM were could be left for headquarters to worry about.

  So, Yukikaze had taken it upon herself to work on this question while she was on standby. That makes her a better pilot than I am, Rei thought. Still, he had to make sure that she hadn’t gone insane. So long as he didn’t know how she thought, he feared that she might once again cast him out of her.

  Yukikaze probably understood the JAM a lot better than any human could. There was no doubt about that, considering no person could match her ability to gather and process data. Yukikaze needed no sleep and would continue with her task as long as her power supplies lasted. But even if she worked round the clock researching strategies and tactics to beat the JAM, that didn’t necessarily mean that she grasped their true nature. He didn’t know if Yukikaze’s conjecture took into account the possibility that the JAM couldn’t perceive human beings. The SAF’s combat intelligences hold that viewpoint, so it’s possible Yukikaze adopted it as well when she consulted them, but perhaps she just doesn’t care? Still, Rei thought, as long as humans continue to fly in her, she has to know that she can’t just ignore us. That he wanted her not to ignore the humans who would ride in her. That they were to fight together, as partners.

  Rei continued monitoring the operation of Yukikaze’s central computer in the cockpit as she waited on standby. That would be the only way he’d ever find out what she was thinking about and what her thought processes were like. It was just like when he was in combat, trying to sense how she’d react.

  Even had Yukikaze been equipped for human communication, Rei guessed that there’d be no way for her to express her conscious thoughts in words. The reason for this was simple—human language had developed to suit human modes of existence. Growing out of a completely different architecture, while she might be able to mimic human expression, there’d most likely be parts that would be untranslatable. For example, Yukikaze’s consciousness would never be able to really use any words that dealt with human emotions. If he were to ask her, “Do you like me?” she’d have no understanding of what the words meant.

  Still, she was able to recognize that her partner, a man named Captain Fukai, was aboard her now. And that if he operated her in a certain way, Rei would find the answer to what he sought. It was an unspoken communication between them.

  Yukikaze was aware that Rei was on board because all current planes in the SAF had the ability to tell when their masters were in their cockpits. Both the instrument panel and the helmet Rei currently wasn’t wearing were equipped with small lenses. By capturing an image of his face, Yukikaze could know that it was Rei who was sitting in her cockpit. The system wasn’t in place simply to recognize who was piloting the plane, but also to constantly monitor the direction and orientation of the pilot’s gaze.

  Yukikaze wasn’t equipped to receive input by glance. She didn’t have an active command input function and there was no way to tell precisely what a pilot was looking at. All the system did was measure the contrast between the iris and the sclera of the eye to tell in which direction the pilot was looking. So, it didn’t allow the pilot to directly input commands by glance alone, but an even more advanced user interface had been created based on the information gathered by the gaze-monitoring system.

  This equipment was still experimental and only installed on the SAF’s planes, but Major Booker didn’t think of the system as experimental when he decided to order the installation. It was a system ready for practical use. The other planes, which had advanced central computers similar to Yukikaze’s, would use the information to anticipate what their pilots were planning and then act on it, Major Booker had thought. He’d had the Systems Corps develop software that would allow machine intelligences to make predictions based on eye-glance input. After a certain period of learning, the plane’s central computer would learn to process the data and use it to decide, Since the pilot is looking at an enemy plane with his naked eye, I should guide the plane in that direction, or Since the pilot has his eyes on the head-up display, I’ll leave the guidance to him and give all my attention to an omnidirectional search for the enemy, or The pilot’s eyes have been closed so long he must have lost consciousness. I will assume full control. That was what it had been developed for.

  Pilot and plane wouldn’t need words to cooperate in combat. The ideal would be for the plane to know what its pilot wanted with just a glance. All that was needed was for the system to perceive clearly what its pilot was looking at in a particular moment. Or at least, that was Major Booker’s theory. They’d only installed the system into her recently, but Rei was sure that Yukikaze had already mastered it. He knew that without needing to ask.

  Yukikaze’s consciousness existed on a completely different level from human consciousness. Nobody could say that she didn’t have it from the start. Humans couldn’t even be sure of how awareness existed in other humans, or how members of their own species conceived of the world. When we examine another person’s behaviors and attitudes, the idea that they see the world as we do is merely a supposition humans are predisposed to make because we all develop from a similar architecture. But it was difficult to make th
at sort of supposition about Yukikaze because she wasn’t human. Even so, Rei hoped that he’d flown together with her long enough that he’d be able to understand her. Or, at the very least, to know if it would be worth trying to understand her.

  Perhaps Yukikaze had already done it on her end. It was clear that she still valued this human named Rei Fukai in her war with the JAM. Even now, she was analyzing their past battles. She wouldn’t be doing that while ignoring his value as a pilot. Well, if she felt that way about him, then he’d return the favor.

  Yukikaze hadn’t changed. Yukikaze had always been Yukikaze. And in realizing that, in realizing that it was he that had changed, Rei had a sudden flash of insight. That he had never really known Yukikaze at all.

  2

  THE ALARM BEEPING on his wristwatch reminded Rei that he had a short lunch meeting scheduled with Major Booker that afternoon.

  Three days had passed since he’d been ordered onto standby. The major had told him about the meeting the previous afternoon but had remained tight-lipped about the agenda or with whom Rei would be meeting. Rei hadn’t pushed the subject. The major’s attitude told him that nothing more would be revealed before the meeting. Not that it really mattered.

  Rei wanted to know what it was that Yukikaze was doing in the background as they waited, but his enthusiasm for the project hadn’t yielded proportionate results.

  Yukikaze’s central computer seemed to be constantly tracking the mission status of all the SAF’s planes, demanding the data on them from the computers in headquarters as it came in. For that reason, Rei could see where all the other planes were and follow what they were doing on Yukikaze’s main display.